Social media interactive advertising and purchase intention of the UAE customers: an empirical analysis

The advent of social media technologies, specifically the phenomenal growth of online and interactive advertising, has assisted various organizations in responding to and communicating with respective consumers at sustainable expenditures through various online channels, including social media, with immense potential and popularity levels. Limited studies have been conducted to examine the connection between consumer engagements by small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and their respective promotional performances, as consumer purchase intention would be notably affected by the ability of an enterprise to interact and share information. Therefore, the current study aims to evaluate the impacts of attitude, brand loyalty, brand image, and brand awareness on interactive advertising and engagement with consumers via social media in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to promote SME digital lifestyle products. Accordingly, a quantitative survey was administered to evaluate 308 responses from customers of companies vending digital lifestyle products before conducting partial least square structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) to analyze the collected data. The results demonstrated significant positive relationships between both brand loyalty and brand awareness and consumer purchase intention, respectively, whereas the relationships between attitude and brand image and consumer purchase intention were separately discovered to be insignificant

Trends in dermatomyositis- and polymyositis-related mortality in the state of São Paulo, Brazil, 1985-2007: multiple cause-of-death analysis

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Dermatomyositis (DM) and polymyositis (PM) are rare systemic autoimmune rheumatic diseases with high fatality rates. There have been few population-based mortality studies of dermatomyositis and polymyositis in the world, and none have been conducted in Brazil. The objective of the present study was to employ multiple-cause-of-death methodology in the analysis of trends in mortality related to dermatomyositis and polymyositis in the state of São Paulo, Brazil, between 1985 and 2007.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>We analyzed mortality data from the São Paulo State Data Analysis System, selecting all death certificates on which DM or PM was listed as a cause of death. The variables sex, age and underlying, associated or total mentions of causes of death were studied using mortality rates, proportions and historical trends. Statistical analysis were performed by chi-square and H Kruskal-Wallis tests, variance analysis and linear regression. A p value less than 0.05 was regarded as significant.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Over a 23-year period, there were 318 DM-related deaths and 316 PM-related deaths. Overall, DM/PM was designated as an underlying cause in 55.2% and as an associated cause in 44.8%; among 634 total deaths females accounted for 71.5%. During the study period, age- and gender-adjusted DM mortality rates did not change significantly, although PM as an underlying cause and total mentions of PM trended lower (p < 0.05). The mean ages at death were 47.76 ± 20.81 years for DM and 54.24 ± 17.94 years for PM (p = 0.0003). For DM/PM, respectively, as underlying causes, the principal associated causes of death were as follows: pneumonia (in 43.8%/33.5%); respiratory failure (in 34.4%/32.3%); interstitial pulmonary diseases and other pulmonary conditions (in 28.9%/17.6%); and septicemia (in 22.8%/15.9%). For DM/PM, respectively, as associated causes, the following were the principal underlying causes of death: respiratory disorders (in 28.3%/26.0%); circulatory disorders (in 17.4%/20.5%); neoplasms (in 16.7%/13.7%); infectious and parasitic diseases (in 11.6%/9.6%); and gastrointestinal disorders (in 8.0%/4.8%). Of the 318 DM-related deaths, 36 involved neoplasms, compared with 20 of the 316 PM-related deaths (p = 0.03).</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Our study using multiple cause of deaths found that DM/PM were identified as the underlying cause of death in only 55.2% of the deaths, indicating that both diseases were underestimated in the primary mortality statistics. We observed a predominance of deaths in women and in older individuals, as well as a trend toward stability in the mortality rates. We have confirmed that the risk of death is greater when either disease is accompanied by neoplasm, albeit to lesser degree in individuals with PM. The investigation of the underlying and associated causes of death related to DM/PM broaden the knowledge of the natural history of both diseases and could help integrate mortality data for use in the evaluation of control measures for DM/PM.</p

The impact of surgical delay on resectability of colorectal cancer: An international prospective cohort study

AIM: The SARS-CoV-2 pandemic has provided a unique opportunity to explore the impact of surgical delays on cancer resectability. This study aimed to compare resectability for colorectal cancer patients undergoing delayed versus non-delayed surgery. METHODS: This was an international prospective cohort study of consecutive colorectal cancer patients with a decision for curative surgery (January-April 2020). Surgical delay was defined as an operation taking place more than 4 weeks after treatment decision, in a patient who did not receive neoadjuvant therapy. A subgroup analysis explored the effects of delay in elective patients only. The impact of longer delays was explored in a sensitivity analysis. The primary outcome was complete resection, defined as curative resection with an R0 margin. RESULTS: Overall, 5453 patients from 304 hospitals in 47 countries were included, of whom 6.6% (358/5453) did not receive their planned operation. Of the 4304 operated patients without neoadjuvant therapy, 40.5% (1744/4304) were delayed beyond 4 weeks. Delayed patients were more likely to be older, men, more comorbid, have higher body mass index and have rectal cancer and early stage disease. Delayed patients had higher unadjusted rates of complete resection (93.7% vs. 91.9%, P = 0.032) and lower rates of emergency surgery (4.5% vs. 22.5%, P < 0.001). After adjustment, delay was not associated with a lower rate of complete resection (OR 1.18, 95% CI 0.90-1.55, P = 0.224), which was consistent in elective patients only (OR 0.94, 95% CI 0.69-1.27, P = 0.672). Longer delays were not associated with poorer outcomes. CONCLUSION: One in 15 colorectal cancer patients did not receive their planned operation during the first wave of COVID-19. Surgical delay did not appear to compromise resectability, raising the hypothesis that any reduction in long-term survival attributable to delays is likely to be due to micro-metastatic disease

Global, regional, and national incidence of six major immune-mediated inflammatory diseases: findings from the global burden of disease study 2019

Background The causes for immune-mediated inflammatory diseases (IMIDs) are diverse and the incidence trends of IMIDs from specific causes are rarely studied. The study aims to investigate the pattern and trend of IMIDs from 1990 to 2019. Methods We collected detailed information on six major causes of IMIDs, including asthma, inflammatory bowel disease, multiple sclerosis, rheumatoid arthritis, psoriasis, and atopic dermatitis, between 1990 and 2019, derived from the Global Burden of Disease study in 2019. The average annual percent change (AAPC) in number of incidents and age standardized incidence rate (ASR) on IMIDs, by sex, age, region, and causes, were calculated to quantify the temporal trends. Findings In 2019, rheumatoid arthritis, atopic dermatitis, asthma, multiple sclerosis, psoriasis, inflammatory bowel disease accounted 1.59%, 36.17%, 54.71%, 0.09%, 6.84%, 0.60% of overall new IMIDs cases, respectively. The ASR of IMIDs showed substantial regional and global variation with the highest in High SDI region, High-income North America, and United States of America. Throughout human lifespan, the age distribution of incident cases from six IMIDs was quite different. Globally, incident cases of IMIDs increased with an AAPC of 0.68 and the ASR decreased with an AAPC of −0.34 from 1990 to 2019. The incident cases increased across six IMIDs, the ASR of rheumatoid arthritis increased (0.21, 95% CI 0.18, 0.25), while the ASR of asthma (AAPC = −0.41), inflammatory bowel disease (AAPC = −0.72), multiple sclerosis (AAPC = −0.26), psoriasis (AAPC = −0.77), and atopic dermatitis (AAPC = −0.15) decreased. The ASR of overall and six individual IMID increased with SDI at regional and global level. Countries with higher ASR in 1990 experienced a more rapid decrease in ASR. Interpretation The incidence patterns of IMIDs varied considerably across the world. Innovative prevention and integrative management strategy are urgently needed to mitigate the increasing ASR of rheumatoid arthritis and upsurging new cases of other five IMIDs, respectively. Funding The Global Burden of Disease Study is funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. The project funded by Scientific Research Fund of Sichuan Academy of Medical Sciences & Sichuan Provincial People's Hospital (2022QN38)

The Role of Trust and Brand Equity on Purchase Intention of Customers of SME Digital Products: The Mediating Effect of Social Media Interactive Engagement

Through social media technologies, organizations communicate and respond to information from their customers with minimal costs. This has led to the phenomenal growth of “online and interactive advertising”; clearly pointing towards its immense potential and popularity through various channels including Social Media. The tendency to share and interact information affect the performance of SMEs but there are only few researches on the connection between SME’s social media interaction and their performance. Therefore, this study aims to examine the effect of attitude, brand loyalty, brand image and brand awareness, and trust towards interactive advertising with social media on promoting SMEs products on digital lifestyle in United Arab Emirate (UAE). A quantitative survey is to be explored to determine the factors that influence the use of Online Interactive advertising in different companies dealing with digital lifestyles in UAE and its impact on the business performance. Considering attitude, brand loyalty, brand image and brand awareness, and trust from customers through social media technology adoption, it is pertinent to get a better understanding of how effective Interactive Advertising is in promoting SMEs products on digital lifestyle via social media. This study employed the theories of planned behaviour and reasoned action as the underpinning theories to support the conceptual framework on interactive advertising on social media. This study also employed survey questionnaire to gather data from respondents of SMEs in the United Arab emirate (UAE) while PLSSEM is used as analysis technique

Social Media Interactive Advertising and Purchase Intention of the UAE Customers: An Empirical Analysis

The advent of social media technologies, specifically the phenomenal growth of online and interactive advertising, has assisted various organizations in responding to and communicating with respective consumers at sustainable expenditures through various online channels, including social media, with immense potential and popularity levels. Limited studies have been conducted to examine the connection between consumer engagements by small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and their respective promotional performances, as consumer purchase intention would be notably affected by the ability of an enterprise to interact and share information. Therefore, the current study aims to evaluate the impacts of attitude, brand loyalty, brand image, and brand awareness on interactive advertising and engagement with consumers via social media in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to promote SME digital lifestyle products. Accordingly, a quantitative survey was administered to evaluate 308 responses from customers of companies vending digital lifestyle products before conducting partial least square structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) to analyze the collected data. The results demonstrated significant positive relationships between both brand loyalty and brand awareness and consumer purchase intention, respectively, whereas the relationships between attitude and brand image and consumer purchase intention were separately discovered to be insignificant

Therapeutic Ultrasound Examination of Follicular Reserve, and Ovarian Tissue Angiogenesis in Mice, 14 Days after Heterotopic Transplantation

Introduction: One of the challenges facing ovarian transplantation is overcoming the ischemia/ reperfusion injury. When blood supply to the implanted tissue is suboptimal (immediate post implant period), ultrasound therapy has been shown to increase mass transport. The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of ultrasound on heterotopic transplantation of mouse ovarian tissue. Methods: Adult female NMRI mice were selected and divided into the control, sham and experimental groups. In the experimental group, left ovarian tissue, after auto transplantation into the back muscle, underwent ultrasound exposure with intensity of 0.3 w/cm2, frequency of 3MHz & pulse mode of 1:4, for five minutes daily. The transplanted ovaries were removed and immediately fixed for histological study. Furthermore, rate of angiogenesis was assessed by immunohistochemistry Cd31 test. Results: The study results showed that the CD31 angiogenic factor was expressed more in the irradiated animals than in control group animals and ultrasound-therapy resulted in better follicular preservation. Conclusion: The ultrasound therapy can improve preservation of ovarian follicle .This is probably due to acceleration of angiogenesis and increase in production of growth factors by low intensity pulse ultrasound